Welcome to the 11th weekly edition of “Raiding the IDP Waiver Wire” for 2021! For those returning for another installment of defensive player recommendations, your interest and support are appreciated! 

This weekly column will help you, the reader, plunder your league’s waiver wire for real value where it counts: in your line-ups. We’ll dig into the past week’s top performers among available options for repeatable production. 

“Raiding the IDP Waiver Wire” is written for fantasy football gamers in leagues that require a full complement of 11 defensive starters in leagues of 12 to 16 teams. Recommendations rely on scoring settings from FantasyPros.com, even though their value for passes defensed is low. We’ll look for options at both conventional and true defensive positions as they arise. 

Players qualifying for this column are those rostered in no more than a third of IDP leagues on MyFantasyLeague.com (MFL); moreover, new names appear in each edition. Occasional readers are encouraged to visit past weeks’ write-ups for more options. Finally, these recommendations further assume you, the manager, have finite roster space with challenging cut decisions to add new names.

Two weeks ago, “Raiding the Waiver Wire” featured a couple of emerging unknowns, each of whom has made plays in consecutive weeks since. Last week, this column highlighted two veterans that underwhelmed over the first half of the season but are finding their rhythm along with their entire defensive units. Both players scored sacks in Week 12. This week’s theme is that of high-profile veterans returning from IR. In a week with numerous injuries of (as of this writing) uncertain severity, the quality reinforcements from the waiver wire will be more than welcome.

Demarcus Lawrence, Cowboys DE

When healthy, Demarcus Lawrence has been one of the most effective defensive ends in the NFL. Don’t believe me? He has three top-ten finishes in season-long fantasy points among defensive linemen according to FantasyPros.com in his career of seven full seasons going on eight. Admittedly, my opening qualifier – when healthy – is too frequent an issue for Lawrence. 

Lawrence is set to rejoin a defense that should be playing downhill in its next four versus the Saints, the Football Team twice, and the Giants. The Cowboys pass rush has helped the likes of Tarell Basham, Dorance Armstrong, rookie Chauncey Golston, and a certain phenomenal off-ball linebacker named Micah Parsons collect sacks off the edge in recent weeks. It might sound like a hot take to proclaim Lawrence a superior pass-rusher to Parsons, but it’s a fact.

Bradley Chubb, Broncos EDGE

The fifth overall pick of the 2018 NFL draft was seemingly forgotten by fantasy gamers the moment he was drafted. The anomalies of conventional position designations turned OLB Bradley Chubb into a pumpkin in rookie drafts. He would have been a first-rounder in many IDP leagues and delivered on the promise with 12.5 QB sacks in his first campaign. 

Injuries and game scripts have slowed him since. He got back on the field Sunday but on a snap count. He was quiet in his first action since September, so his price in waivers will be much less than that for Demarcus Lawrence. 

The Broncos have shown life with recent victories over the Cowboys and the Chargers. Seventh-round rookie Jonathon Cooper has surprisingly held his own as a rotational pass-rusher, and Shelby Harris leads a group of decent interior rushers. Chubb isn’t out there by himself after the departure of Von Miller. 

Mykal Walker, Falcons LB

Falcons middle linebacker Deion Jones was a late addition to the injury report last week with a shoulder injury. Although we don’t know the severity of Jones’s injury as of this writing, linebackers typically miss multiple games due to shoulder instability. Their shoulders take more abuse than, say, an offensive guard’s shoulder. 

Jones’s replacement, second-year man Mykal Walker, has barely seen the field for the 2021 Falcons. Preseason narratives had him beefing up to try on a SAM role for size in Dean Pees’s multiple-front defense. Walker took the opportunity to double up his season snap count. More importantly for fantasy gamers, he collected 12 tackles, a pass defensed, and a QB hit. 

Perhaps coincidentally, Walker allowed six receptions on eight targets. Walker can expect to stay busy, as offenses will target him in coverage much more so than his running mate Foye Oluokun or starter Deion Jones. That’s good news for fantasy gamers that land Walker on waivers for as long as Walker can hold onto a full-time role.

Watch List

Like last week, the waiver wire is short on quality additions. It’s getting late in the season for young players to emerge as reliable weekly plays. Recent injuries have presented even less clarity for opportunity than in Atlanta. 

Several players and situations bear watching as the season continues. At defensive tackle, Cleveland sophomore Jordan Elliott is steadily playing half his defense’s snaps and could overtake veteran journeyman Malik Jackson, especially if the Browns fade from contention. It would be only logical for the Lions to get their 2021 second- and third-round picks, Levi Onwuzurike and Alim McNeil more involved.

At linebacker, an injury to Steeler Robert Spillane opens the door just a crack for rookie Buddy Johnson. The 2021 fourth-rounder would need another injury to be fantasy-relevant or a shocking benching of one of the big names ahead of Johnson on the depth chart.

Two players whose names have appeared in this column previously remain strikingly underappreciated. Cleveland safety Ronnie Harrison had a huge game on Sunday night after weeks of puzzlingly low efficiency. The Broncos trotted out rookie Baron Browning as a full-time linebacker again after an injury and a bye. The 2021 second-rounder remains by far the most widely available full-time off-ball linebacker on the MFL platform. 

In a role reversal, safety Jacquiski Tartt has taken on more of a deep role for the 49ers while running mate Jimmie Ward patrols the line of scrimmage either from the slot or the box. A big primetime showing in Week 10 only incrementally boosted Ward’s ownership, leaving open an opportunity for needy fantasy gamers.

Happy Bidding!

The combination of bye weeks and injury uncertainty is requiring fantasy gamers to be particularly vigilant in the stretch run of the 2021 season. The lesson of Deion Jones’s shoulder is for gamers to keep abreast of daily news and for league commissioners to disallow first-come first-served waivers until Sunday. (Don’t reward those who hover over the bird app every day!)

This column drops every Tuesday afternoon. I’ll attach recommendations of widely rostered players one might consider dropping to make room for these players on Twitter. I look forward to interacting with you there!

A Clemson and Michigan alum, a fan of the Cowboys and Panthers, I try to see both sides of every debate and every fantasy football trade. Reach out to me @DynastyTripp on Twitter.